France will ban children from wearing the abaya – the loose-fitting, full-length robes worn by some Muslim women, in state-run schools – its education minister said on Sunday in advance of the back-to-school season.
France, which has enforced a strict ban on religious signs in state schools since 19th-century laws removed any traditional Catholic influence from public education, has struggled to update guidelines to deal with a growing Muslim minority.
In 2004, it banned headscarves in schools and passed a ban on full face veils in public in 2010, angering some in its five million-strong Muslim community.
Defending secularism is a rallying cry in France that resonates across the political spectrum, from left-wingers upholding the liberal values of the Enlightenment to far-right voters seeking a bulwark against the growing role of Islam in French society.
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“I have decided that the abaya could no longer be worn in schools,” Education Minister Gabriel Attal said in an interview with TV channel TF1.
“When you walk into a classroom, you shouldn’t be able to identify the pupils’ religion just by looking at them,” he said. – Reuters